Conceit Read online

  Pegge was pulling the frozen bedsheet off the tree when she heard the clatter of wheels on the pavingstones. Soon Mr Harvey was helping his wife out of their carriage, which righted itself with a jolt as she stepped down. Con had gained weight, and all of it protruded out the front. As Con approached, Pegge shook out the sheet so that the ice flew sharply across the courtyard. Pegge carried the sheet in a lump into the kitchen and hung it near the fire, where it began to give off a fragrant steam.

  In the passage, Con was playing with Sadie, who rolled over to be scratched on her belly, forgiving Con’s desertion in an instant after pining the whole winter. Walton was coming down the stairs, his eyes fixed on Con, as if he had never laid eyes on a woman with child before. Con stood up slowly, her hands coyly supporting her back, and Walton began to stammer, unable to say two good words in a row. Although she was almost thirty, Con’s hair was still a glossy black.

  “Like a raven’s wing,” Walton whispered, possibly to Pegge, who was too annoyed with both of them to answer.

  As if he could tell a raven from a rook or crow Egg white and some secret powder—gunpowder, black bile?—had given Con’s hair that avian sheen. Even in March, the scent of honeysuckle drifted from her, though no man had ever questioned its unseasonable source.

  Con should have stayed in Barking to tend to her own husband, who appeared to have lost weight under her regime. Mr Harvey’s scalp was sallow and unloved, and his whiskers were ragged around the edges as if she had little time to lavish on them.

  “Why have you come?” Pegge asked her sister.

  Con’s eyes rounded. “To care for Father, of course. You know how eager he is to die. He has written of nothing else in his letters.”

  “Nothing else,” echoed the gentle Mr Harvey, shifting his eyes away from Pegge’s. “A most pious man, most pious indeed …” His voice trailed out the door.

  Would no one talk sense except herself? “If Father dies, it will be because he has taken it into his head to let his soul feed off his body.”

  “Then why so downhearted, Pegge?” Con asked. “I am sure his soul is merry. We must arrange everything most becomingly, as befits his stature.”

  “He wishes to be buried in a private manner.”

  “But in that place assigned to him in Paul’s,” Walton added, looking uneasily from sister to sister.

  “Englishmen are usually buried with their wives,” Pegge said.

  Con tilted her head, a bird alerted to an insect stirring underground. “Surely you did not think he would be buried with our mother?”

  “He made a promise to her.”

  “Years ago—and in a poem! Can you not let go of that poor fable? There will be no mention of that marriage in the funeral in the cathedral. I will speak to Jo about arrangements tomorrow. And to you, of course, Mr Walton, for your letters have told me how useful you have been. He is past speaking for himself, so we must speak for him.”

  The boy came in at one end of Con’s box, with Mr Harvey labouring at the other. As Mr Harvey rested beneath the picture called The Skeleton, working up courage for the flight of stairs ahead, the kitchenmaid stuck her head into the passage and asked what was to be done with the Dean’s cold dish of soup. Should she heat it up or throw it out?

  “I’ll take it in to him,” Con offered.

  Walton held her jacket as she slipped out of it. “I’ll come with you,” he said.

  Mr Harvey looked at his wife as if he had only just noticed how full and soft her lips were. Con swept her palm across her neck, preening in the heat of Walton’s gaze. There was an unseemly incandescence about her skin, like a pale worm flushed out into the street by rain.

  “No,” Pegge said to Con, “he will want me, not you. He likes me to hold the bowl while he sips. As for other visitors,” she said to Walton, “you know he has no use for you at this hour.”

  “I meant,” Walton stammered, “only that I would read to Dr Donne while Mrs Harvey fed him. I have transcribed another of his sermons.”

  Pegge gripped the bowl. “If you want him to hold this down, you’ll both stay out. He needs help using the close-stool now. I doubt you would care to do that, Con.” Then, assessing her sister’s face, “You may see him in the morning when he is rested. You must be tired yourself after the long coach ride.”

  Luxuriously big-bellied, bathed in male attention as pungent as musk, Con had never looked less weary to her younger sister.

  “I will come in early to shave him,” Con said.

  “His skin is more tender now. No, I think you had better leave such things to me.” Pegge hoped Mr Harvey would take his wife straight up to bed and out of Walton’s addled sight. “I am sure Mrs Walton is expecting you home for fried eels,” Pegge said as she pushed past him with the lukewarm soup.

  When Pegge saw her father lying flat on his back, she knew he would not take even a sip of broth. A drop of Christ’s blood would have been more to his liking. She put the bowl down on the hearth for Sadie.

  The dog was baking her fleas next to the glowing coals, her sleep full of yelps and apprehensions, as if ghosts were paying irksome visitations. As old for a dog as the Dean was for a man, Sadie no longer harrowed Hounds-ditch or even ventured outside the City walls. Now it was as much as Sadie could do to sneak into the death-room to keep vigil with Pegge beside her father.

  Pegge unwound the gauze on one of her father’s feet and peeled back the moss. The morning’s worms were feeding sweetly on his toes. He seemed to be enjoying the maggots, as if he were already in his grave, being worked into a slime by grubs. Was conspiring with maggots a form of suicide? Pegge ripped off the poultices and threw them on the fire. When the maggots began to pop and hiss, Sadie ran out of the room in fear.

  Her father’s nostrils twitched from the smoke. “Write this down,” he ordered, his eyes closed.

  She snatched the quill from the ink and lowered it to the first sheet she could find.

  “Since I am coming to that holy room, where, with thy choir of saints for evermore, I shall be made thy music.”

  “Those are iambics, Father, shall I break it into lines?”

  He nodded and recited the rest, tripping over the words in his eagerness to get them out. He must have composed it in his head and waited, a cow with a painfully stretched udder, for someone to come in to milk him.

  “Did you get six stanzas?”

  “Yes, six, with five lines each.”

  “Now check the rhymes.”

  She did as he asked. “I have them all.”

  “That is my last poem, Pegge. See that it gets to Marriot for printing with the others. I am glad it was you who came into the room just now. Of all my children, you have the most poetry in you, though God knows how you will use it.”

  She turned away to fold the paper so he would not see her tears. Which had he meant most—that she had some poetry in her, or that he doubted she had the talent to make use of it? A smugness was spreading over his face, because he had gotten the poem out or more likely because he needed to use the close-stool. She would have to bring the pan to him, but he disliked her asking him directly.

  “Do you want anything, Father?” It came out hesitant and bleating.

  His eyes opened, with a glint of triumph in them. “I want you to marry, like your sisters.”

  She had not expected that, said nothing, let the anger dry her tears. She decided to make him wait until morning to learn that Con had arrived, big with child. A son, Con had been most definite. How did a woman know such things?

  Pegge straightened the papers on the table. “Do you wish to speak to Mr Marriot yourself?”

  “I am done conversing with the living. I am as flat and foul upon the earth as a rotting horse or dog.”

  There was no arguing with a dying man, even one who still had strength for punning, and she knew now that he had not been counterfeiting, for gathering on his skin, in all the creases of his flesh, clinging to his hair and nails, was the odour of mortality.
/>   Con had been there a day, organizing the household, but each time she entered their father’s room, his eyes were closed. Now he was spread out stiffly on top of the blanket, his arms extended like the top beam of a cross. Pegge sat beside him, touching his cheek now and then to soothe him. When he spoke, it was a porridge of half-digested phrases. At least he was not asking for Con, for the name he most often called out was Ann.

  Walton was readying the chamber for her father’s death. He carried in the shroud and the coffin-lid with the death portrait, then strode back in with Thomas Mores skull. “A memento mori.” He held it up joyfully. “A death’s head to meditate on. Has your father finished his last poem?”

  His last poem—it was not much of a secret if Izaak Walton knew about it. She took the poem from her pocket and held it out. He handed her the skull and walked about the room, savaging the rhythm. Soon he would be downstairs, quoting it to anyone who would listen. But no, he would not leave her in peace, his little book was coming out, the pages turning.

  “I have been writing a poem too,” he said, “for the Dean’s funeral, but I have yet to find all the words. Perhaps you could assist me.”

  “Why don’t you show it to Con? I am sure she will be glad to advise you.” She held the death’s head at arm’s length while Walton, pleased with her suggestion, made a little note. “Why do you encourage my father in thoughts of martyrdom?”

  “You seem destined for that fate yourself,” he said, “for if you die a virgin you will go to heaven with an arrow’s speed.”

  She whirled around, almost dropping the saint’s head she was lifting up to the high shelf. “Did my father ask you to say that?”

  “He cannot see it there. Let it sit here in plain view.” Walton took the skull and placed it on the table.

  As their hands touched, the scent of green almond teased Pegge’s nose. There was only one plant that smelt like that in England-bracken. After gutting a fish, Walton cleaned his hands on bracken, then cut fistfuls to cushion the catch on its ride home in his pouch.

  “What fish are biting that make it worth braving the cold, Izzy? It is not yet the end of March.”

  He held a finger to his lips, nodding towards the bed. Of course. He would not want the Dean to learn where he went in the mornings. It was no wonder he was as brown and vigorous as he had ever been. He must keep his tackle near the river, since she had never seen him leaving London with it.

  “Does Mrs Walton know?”

  “She leaves me to my own pursuits. I am no good at linen-drapery, Pegge,” he confessed, a little too happily, “no good at all. I cannot tell linen from wool.” He stooped to waylay a good-sized beetle that was heading to a dark corner. “This will catch a fine trout, but where shall I keep it?”

  Pegge held out a flask. As round as an alchemist’s retort, it made a perfect bait jar.

  “That is for his sacred wine,” he said, stepping back.

  “As you see, it is empty.” She tipped it upside down. “The bishop came yesterday to give him his last communion.”

  “If he sins now, he will die without absolution.” He peeked in his fist to see how the specimen was faring. “But I suppose there is little chance of that, for he can hardly last another day.”

  He dropped the beetle into the flask and placed it on the window-sill to admire it. “Your father’s death will be exemplary. Even his effigy will start a fashion. Every churchman in England will want to be carved standing upright in his shroud.” His hand fell earnestly upon her sleeve. “Will you agree to be betrothed, Pegge? It would relieve your father’s mind.” He looked at her closely. “Your hair will soon be long enough.”

  So they had been discussing her. Walton and her father. Con and Walton. And next, unless she kept them separate, her father and his fertile eldest daughter. What of Pegge’s barren womb-had they spoken of that too? By week’s end, all the servants, even the Dean’s new errand boy, would know that Pegge was still without her fleurs.

  The scent of almonds hung over the Deanery that night. Perhaps Bess had been blanching dried almonds and slipping off the wet skins to make a funeral cake, or perhaps, Pegge feared, her sense of smell had finally run amok. The coldness of her womb, the arousing dreams that poisoned sleep, her father’s dying, all were mixed up with fish guts nestled in crushed bracken on some forbidden riverbank.

  When Mr and Mrs Harvey had arrived with their servants, Pegge had been shunted into Bess’s chamber. Now the shutters cast long shadows, fraught with dread, across the narrow ceiling. Towards dawn, the door slammed and the bed pitched sideways. Bess was jerking her swollen foot, trying to get it out of the toe of a knitted stocking. Soon the other foot was being violently extracted. At least the garlic was chasing off the troubling scent of almonds.

  “Will you be groaning much longer?” Bess asked.

  Pegge clutched her pelvis. “It is a melancholy womb, such as my mother had.” What did it matter if she even had a womb, since it would never be wived or mothered?

  “More likely it’s Aphrodite’s curse,” Bess grumbled. “And long overdue at that. Your mother’s womb was fallen, not melancholy. It wasn’t made to bear a dozen of you children.”

  Heaving herself up, Bess opened a small cupboard, uncorking something brown and still fermenting that Pegge could hardly swallow. Bess’s nighttime remedies had always been foul, to discourage the children from waking her at night.

  Pegge shuddered as the last spoonful went down. “I doubt you know who Aphrodite is, Bess.”

  “I know this much. Something is making you sour and green, as if the pox on your face wasn’t enough.”

  Pegge knew who Aphrodite was and why she had scarred Pegge’s face. She had asked for love but Aphrodite had denied her. Try as Pegge might, she could not break Con’s hold over Walton. Even Con’s two husbands, even Walton’s own wife with her thriving shop, could not cure him of his lovesickness. Con had stopped up his arteries of sense with some love-potion.

  “There are too many sick dogs moaning in this house,” Bess said. “You’re in that old man’s room too much. A wife wouldn’t do the things you do.”

  “How would you know? You’ve never been a wife.” Pegge was too pigheaded to stop now. “Do you think Con would give him better care?”

  Bess considered this, then let it go. “Maybe you want to rub up against that fisherman. A sorry mess this household’s in. He’s a lickspittle to your father and you’re a lickspittle to him.”

  “That was years ago, Bess, before I had the pox.”

  “I saw you on the landing yesterday, eavesdropping on him and Constance.” Bess poked around in the cupboard again. “Tomorrow, I’ll show you how to fill in those pock-marks with paste.” She yawned and produced a pessary from somewhere. “Have a look down there. We can’t wait forever.”

  Pegge held up the blanket to screen her thighs. The hairs had grown a little darker, but still the blood refused to flow. She shook her head, ashamed. Bess showed her how to use the pessary, whipping the padding between her own legs, catching the loop and tying it around her waist. The whole thing came off just as swiftly and landed, as Pegge crimsoned, in her hand.

  “I don’t need them anymore,” Bess said. “You can have the lot of them.” Then a bristle-brush came out, Bess’s remedy for a red, itchy scalp caused by anything from fleas to ringworm. “Let me brush some life into that hair for you.”

  “Oh, please, do not!” Pegge cried, burrowing underneath the blanket. Even her hair was sore this night.

  The mattress sank to the floorboards as Bess heaved up her legs. Pegge had no choice but to lie with her back to Bess, shivering from the ache inside.

  “We must get you married off as soon as your father is finished this last business of his,” Bess said. Something was catching in her throat. “If you go to live with Constance, I’ll see no more of you.”

  Pegge was afraid to speak, in case her own throat was afflicted. She had not thought of going somewhere without Bess. This damp, dreary ni
ght would never end, Pegge hardly able to breathe for lack of space, in danger of flying off the bed if Bess’s weight shifted by so much as an inch.

  “If you married, that would be different,” Bess encouraged. “I could come to live with you.”

  “I would like a man,” Pegge admitted in a whisper, “but if I tell my father, I fear he will get me the wrong one.”

  “What’s wrong or right about them? I had a man once. Little good it did me.”

  Pegge had not heard this story. “Who was he, Bess?”

  Bess snorted. “A Frenchman with slippery hands.”

  “Is he the one who broke your nose?”

  Another snort, and then a snuffle. The heat from Bess was like a blast furnace, making sleep seem finally possible. In an hour, the ceiling would be stitched with light and Pegge would be needed at her father’s bedside.

  16. NECROPSY OF LOVE

  When I left Loseley park with you as Ann Donne, my sweet husband, I took only the mare I was riding and Bess on a black nag behind me. Later, my father sent my oak bed to us on a wagon, but whether he was being kind or could not bear it in his house, I never did discover.

  One or another of our children was always ill. In letters to your friends, you called our cottage at Mitcham my poor hospital and said your wife had fallen into a discomposure. You complained of being circumcised for bread, forced to eat cucumbers and onions in the country when you might have fed on melons and sweetmeats at court. You could find no employment equal to your talents. Patronage—how your lips caressed the word. To be ambassador to Venice, secretary of Virginia or even Ireland! The best you could do in all those years was Sir Robert Drury.